This disclosure relates to non-destructive inspection of an article and, more particularly, to inspection using a computerized three-dimensional representation of an internal feature of the article.
Articles, such as gas turbine engine components, are inspected to ensure that the article meets design geometry or other criteria, for example. The inspection can be relatively complex for articles that include internal features. For example, gas turbine engine airfoils are often designed with positive and negative internal features, such as internal walls and passages, respectively, which must meet certain design criteria.
One technique for inspecting such internal features utilizes a destructive method where the article is physically sectioned and ground-down to reveal the internal geometry of interest in the inspection. However, such a technique, obviously, destroys the article and can require precise sectioning and grinding that are subject to inaccuracies. Moreover, the ground sample does not provide a full representation of the feature because the section is a two-dimensional, single plane through the feature.